


The East Wind Takes Us All

by panickedbee



Series: Those Who Vow [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, His Last Vow Spoilers, Holmes Brothers, M/M, Mycroft-centric, Sherlock-centric, Unresolved Emotional Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-10
Updated: 2015-08-10
Packaged: 2018-04-14 01:34:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4545120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/panickedbee/pseuds/panickedbee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock said it before, in his head, and he means it. He doesn't regret. Last time, he saved John's life. He saved three lives, and lost two. He knew, back then, that if the threat of Moriarty ought to go, he would have to go down with him. So they fell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The East Wind Takes Us All

**Author's Note:**

> Just my little interpretation of the end of _His Last Vow_. I'm sorry, it's still very sad.

It looks brighter than he last remembered. This place has certainly been a lot darker in his head. He misses it. The darkness, that is. The lighting, the warm, wooden colours seem much more inappropriate than he would want it to be in here. He would want to leave this place with the memory of it being cold and comfortless, so he would not have to tell himself not to feel, _don't feel don't feel,_ all the time.

Apart from being simply annoying, it also has the terrible side effect of haunting him. As if making up for all the years where he had told himself to have perfectionated the act of surpressing his own feelings. But now that they are finally free, they won't leave him alone ever again. Which will eventually always result in him being left alone by everyone else.

Of course, Sherlock knows why his brother has chosen this place, the Diogenes Club, instead of his other office, which is indeed cold and comfortless, and he prefers not to think about this. Unfortunately, he has already racked his brain about it. As whatever remains, naturally, always has to be true, however impossible that might appear to be, he has come to the conclusion that Mycroft wants Sherlock to remember him in not as negative a light as he might believe to be cast in right now. It is guilt that makes him vulnerable. He wants Sherlock to think better of him while he still has the chance because he is still, after all, Mycroft Holmes's biggest pressure point. (And the term alone disgusts him, having Magnussen forever linked with it.)

Theoretically, Sherlock knows all this. He is just in denial, and he believes that, for he is soon about to go to his death, he has every right to be. He does not want to appreciate what Mycroft does for him. He wants to blame him. In fact, blame everyone! As long as he doesn't have to blame himself. Because that would mean he has to regret it. He doesn't. And now he wants to face his death with something like left dignity and all the insouciance he can scrape together.

So he tries to keep himself from having emotions, or at least from showing them in front of his brother. He always had to be more careful around Mycroft, as those hawk like eyes will wait for only a little shatter of his mask to see right through him. Not that it would make a difference anymore. But _dignity_ , always remember the dignity. He wants to own that, at least, if he cannot own anything else. He wants to be more obsessed with owning it, like he is with other things and _people_ (person, one person) in his life. Because if he can keep it, the dignity, he can at least have the illusion of achievement. One obsession to throw away. Fulfilled obsession will satisfy.

_If_ he was obsessed. He isn't. Not with something as irrelevant, petty,  _childish_ as that.

He thinks he can hear Mycroft talking. His voice sounds softer than he has come to know it. Sherlock pretends to believe it when he tells himself to have imagined it.  _No sentiment._

"You know what will happen now, Sherlock. Don't you?"

He uses almost all of his concentration to focus on not having a lump in his throat, _push it down push it down push it down_ , that he doesn't notice that Mycroft is doing it, too.

This is different. Mycroft knows he is going to lose him this time. What use is it to him to be so powerful when he can't even save his own little brother? Why is it always his responsibility to let people go? He has always been so careful, so eager not to deepen his relationships to anyone, so why does it still hurt? Why does it still hurt so much to let go? He cannot bare the thought of being the only son of his parents. He screwed up. It should be him instead of Sherlock. Naive, innocent, little Sherlock. Who has all the right in this world not to trust him, to despise him.

Oh God. Oh God, what is happening? This can't happen to him now. Not now. This is his role, this is the act he has chosen, this is how he protects. Not the ones he loves, never the ones he loves, but his country. The majority. That's what he is here for. To minimize the damage. Conceal, don't feel.

Sherlock can't help but feel like it all could have happened just yesterday, but at the same time as though it could have been in a whole different lifetime. Three and a half years ago. Also in Mycroft's office. Also knowing what was about to happen. Mycroft had made it as clear to him as he has this time. So damn bloody good at his bloody job. 

No, wait, that wasn't entirely true. This time, it is much more vague and hesitant. They do not need as many words today. The plan is clear and a one-way route. Mycroft said six months. If Sherlock is smart enough, he could be able to survive for twenty-five weeks. Six months. He didn't specifically say  _that_ . Not the surviving part. But they both know what they are talking about.

He thinks about what his brother has said to him on Christmas, which also feels like forever ago.  _Your loss would break my heart._ And how he hates that he can't just delete that, can't just pretend Mycroft would never be proud of him, so he could someday hate him. Now would be a good moment. The less people you miss, the less it hurts. But of course, it doesn't work that way. He has learned that now, about emotions. They won't ever work his way. And it will hurt so much.

Sherlock said it before, in his head, and he means it. He doesn't regret. Last time, he saved John's life. He saved three lives, and lost two. He knew, back then, that if the threat of Moriarty ought to go, he would have to go down with him. So they fell.

Jim from IT, Richard Brook and James Moriarty. Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock the Sociopath, the Virgin, the Freak. They all had to go. Sherlock had to fall to take Moriarty with him. Jim, Richard and James all hit the rooftop at the same time, having swallowed the bullet and bleeding out. He left Sherlock with a smile.

Sherlock left John crying. Just Sherlock. No labels, no pretences. Sherlock died as a whole, leaving his reputation behind as broken as he left John. Leaving John as broken as his nose after John punshed him in the face. Broken as the skin on his back after being whipped, and he felt like the wounds were ripping open when John chucked him to the ground, just like he had ripped open John's wounds by still being alive. Sherlock never even asked himself if he deserved it. It seemed plain clear to him that he did. Logical. _Obvious._ So he never fought back, always letting him.

This time, he doesn't feel like he was leaving John. He doesn't feel like saving him either. He wants to feel like he was doing some good, like he would give him what he wants. But he has never actually asked what John wants, and not knowing that feels horrible because it's the most important thing in the world, but he doesn't want to feel, doesn't want to feel at all. 

John wants this. He must be. After all, he got married, and had sex, got her pregnant without even knowing her real name – and Sherlock was just sounding bitter now. He shouldn't be. Isn't allowed to be. He himself doesn't even know her real name, and he couldn't blame this on John now. It is not his fault, even if he said so before kicking that chair, but it really is not, and psychopaths are not his type. He fell in love with the lovely, kind, not-a-serial-killer Mary Morstan, not with whatever she actually is, and he clearly has not fallen in love with Sherlock the Psychopath. Not that he really was this, a psychopath, but everyone else claims he would be. What people think is stupid.

But even if he just established for himself that John has every reason not to want this, he has to keep himself from thinking about it. He has given this to John, has given John every opportunity to want the Mary Watson life, the life with a child and a clinic and a lying wife, and Sherlock can. not. regret. this. He feels like he might as well kill himself if he chooses to regret. Screw the twenty-five weeks of torture.

He didn't want to feel. So he doesn't regret and doesn't have suicidal thoughts. He just sits here, forearms braced on mahagony wood, legs crossed, swallowing down the last bit of sorrow that was stuck like dust in his throat, and doesn't think about leaving John. He isn't leaving him. He is giving up on him.

"I am ready to face the consequences of my actions."

Mycroft eyes him like there was a stranger sitting in front of him for a second. Who is this person that is talking like an actual adult who can take care of himself, and why doesn't he want to see him? For years and years he has tried to stop seeing his young, foolish baby brother whenever he looked at Sherlock, but now he misses him. He doesn't like what love has done to him, he has explained it to him over and over again because  _Sherlock, caring is not an advantage,_ but he can see that he cares too much for others and too little for himself. It makes him look strong and mature, and Mycroft is absolutely torn between pride and helplessness.

"Good." He actually pauses this time, not knowing what to say or how to phrase it. Eventually, he gets up and takes two glasses out of a shelf. This will be the last time he is going to temp Sherlock with a drug. "Do you think he can take it?"

That's exactly the question he didn't want to be asked, and it hurts, it hurts so much, but he swallows it down,  _down down,_ while he himself cannot, in fact, take it. None of this.

He waits for Mycroft to pour some of the golden brown liquid in both of their glasses before he decides to let a deep breath out of his lungs, and he didn't know he has held it back, but he has, apparently, held it back. For months. Months of terrible silence and breath-holding. He takes the glass as soon as Mycroft slowly wraps his long fingers around his own, and he doesn't hesitate long before he can taste the burning on his lips, gulping it down, past the still very present lump in his throat. He does not know if it's good. He supposes it should be, by social standarts, but he doesn't know if he likes it. It's odd.

_This_ is odd. Mycroft and him drinking together. Well, they are not drinking. Mycroft doesn't drink. They are both enjoying their own glasses of very expensive brandy, just two gentlemen, alone in a room that is surrounded by a world of goldfish.

Sherlock doesn't even want to go there, but he thinks he will actually miss pissing off his brother. That is not so shocking, though. What is much more shocking, frightening even, is when he comes to the point where he has to think  _I'm actually gonna miss seeing his face again at all._

He hates this state of mind. He hates stupid Mycroft with his stupid idea of everything that is good and warm in this world, reminding him that he is a good person by talking to him _here,_ here where John talked to him, too. Even now he could feel it, that long lost connection between John when he has sat here and him as he is sitting here now, for the last time.

He hates Mycroft for not getting it, and stupid Mary for not deserving it, and Moriarty for burning him, and he wishes he could hate every _M_ in this world, and he wants to hate John. God, he wants to hate John, for making him fall, making him fall from that roof and fall for him, that beautiful, perfect _soldier doctor blogger friend_ who has found a way into his heart.

Sherlock wants to tell himself it's scary that someone has caught himself inside of Sherlock's very flesh and bone. He wants it to be more frightening, but it isn't. He's already getting used to it. He has to learn to be used to it. Otherwise his mind will slow _down down down._ And it can't fall. His mind is the only thing he has left. He cannot lose it to a fall.

"When can I see him?" Sherlock can't hold that question back anymore. He needs to know. He knows he sounds childish and impatient (on the inside he does, on the outside he appears very in control of himself, not impatient at all), but it's hard to stay focused and aware of anything else when your head just goes _John John John need to see him need to see him need to say-_

Mycroft drinks up. He looks rather ungentlemanly now, having his glass emptied with such big gulps, but he never stops looking entirely professional. That's what he's for.

"You will all get the chance to say goodbye before you … go. Somewhere at the airport, surely that can be arranged. I'm afraid I can't offer you anything better, brother dear." He really looks sympathetic there, for a moment, right when he says _brother dear._ Somehow Sherlock is convinced that he means it, but it doesn't matter to him.

Mycroft has said _all,_ including Mary, and yes of course, why wouldn't he? Mary, John's pregnant wife, the one he has killed for, the one who has killed him, _that_ one. The one he told John to give his love to, _that one._ Sherlock follows Mycroft's example and tosses down the whole thing, as well. He immediately decides that he doesn't like it, but it's good. It burns, on his tongue, in his throat, in his lungs. His heart. It burns the heart.

"It's fine," he lies, can taste the lie before it has passed his minimally trembelling lips. "It's all fine. As long as I can say goodbye to him. Properly, this time."

_For the last time,_ Mycroft adds in his head and it actually hurts. He cannot believe they're losing. Were they ever not losing? They deserve better. Sherlock deserves so much better.

_Your loss would break my heart._

****************************************************************************************************

The weather is good. Cloudy, but not too cold. The sky seems bluer and the clouds fuller and the grass fits in particularly harmonious with the dark trees far on the horizon.

Isn't it hateful? Mycroft thinks it's hateful. All he can see is Sherlock, no matter how hard he tries to look anywhere else but at him, and he doesn't want to dare drawing the parallel. But he does. Although, it is rather the contrast. Sherlock with his dark hair and his dark, long coat, which he always wears tight around himself whenever he feels most unprotected, his pale skin, all black and white. Being in this colourful, untouched scenery around him that looks oh-so-paintable and boring, and the only colour that it can highlight is the aquamarine of Sherlock's eyes.

They look glassy, he thinks. Glassy blue and green, just like the scenery around them will be for Sherlock if he was to cry right now, and Mycroft hates it, the scenery and the glassy blue and the thought of his little brother crying. He doesn't show any of it. Would never dare.

John and Mary are there, too, and as she says goodbye to him through physical contact, everything feels wrong. He notes that Mary fits the least, with her bright red coat and her platinum blonde hair and everything feels so false and fake and _wrong_ it appals. John is so much more incongruous in the way that Sherlock is; dark coat and the colour slowly draining out of his hair, eyes still blue, still steady, still ocean. Not glassy. But sad. Unbelieving. _Losing._

Sherlock was their anchor in the storm. When he dies, everyone of them will feel it, will die with him a little. He is scared of this moment everyday.

When Sherlock asks him if he can have a moment alone with John, Mycroft is alarmed only for a second. Is he planning on doing what it sounds like he is? Mycroft thinks of how foolish that would be, how  _ not their plan  _ that would be, and if he really does do it, would he even dare to act in a way that-

But then he relaxes. If he really should be that foolish, Mycroft wants to embrace that foolishness one last time, and  _ God, the sentiment.  _ So he counts on that foolishness and bravery in the same way that he doesn't at all, stands back with arched brows and waits for the happy announcement in the same way that he thinks  _ too late, too late, too late now. _

He can get his mind to stop spinning for a moment and concentrates on not watching them too intensely, but as caring is not an advantage, he really, really tries not to care about what happens next for only about five sheer minutes.

Sherlock can only hear his own mind spinning. It currently spins in an orbit that stars John as the sun, and he'd be the Earth running in circles. (He might have looked up a thing or two about the solar systems some while back.) Soon enough he won't be alive enough to be the Earth, he thinks, hasn't ever been alive or human enough to function as a planet. In fact, he probably would have insulted Jupiter enough that it somehow stopped to intercept meteors and astroids, which then would've crashed down on him and destroyed millions of lives.

He would be alright with being the cold, bald moon. Would John be his Earth then, with him in its orbit? Or would he still be the sun, and they could only ever see each other from afar, never touch, never equal?

Sherlock stops the metaphors right there, he knows he only wants to distract himself from facing the truth. The truth of losing and leaving.

They talk empty words and he wants to leave John laughing. His smile is everything that can keep his heart from splitting in two right now, and it sets something free inside of him. Something along … Hope? Courage? Light-headedness?

He desperately tries to keep his lips from tingling and his throat from tightening and his hands from clenching, but, just like everything else that he did since he came back, he fails this. (He didn't fail planning John's wedding to a psychopathic assassin, though.)

"John, there's something … I should say- I've _meant_ to say always and then never have … Since it's unlikely we'll ever meet again, I might as well say it now."

 _Unlikely we'll ever meet again_ still revolves around his quivering heart, mixed up on a pile of feelings and fears of _should_ and _shouldn't's._ Does _unlikely_ mean impossible? It might as well be that because Sherlock will be dead soon and John wouldn't even know. He doesn't have to. Isn't allowed to. The last time, John thought he was dead and he wasn't. Wasn't at all, was in fact fighting and travelling and being miserable, no time to be dead. This time, he wants John to believe he will be alive forever, still fighting, travelling through Eastern Europe, solving puzzles and being not so miserable without him. Their era is over, but the game never will be.

That's when he realises he cannot do it. He cannot tell John what he feels, what his body consists of, what has been screaming at him for such a long time, and what he was finally smart enough to listen to not so long ago. He  _loves him loves him loves him,_ but he can't do this to him. Can't tell him. And could not ever bear the thought of John thinking it was just a joke.

"Sherlock is actually a girl's name." There it is. The joke. Followed by John's precious smile.

Sherlock smiles shyly for making him laugh again, but his eyes still look sad and glassy because now he will never get another chance. It's better this way, he tells himself. Everything else would've been selfish.

"It's not," John says, of course it's not.

"It was worth a try."

"We're not naming our daughter after you."

"I think it could work." That isn't a joke. He thinks about it, allows himself to consider it silently in his head, that _Sherlock Watson_ could truly work in another universe far away from here.

John chuckles very quietly and looks up to him. Sherlock has to look down after the barest second of contact with ocean blue, steady, sad. He eventually takes off the glove of his right hand and holds it out, waiting.

"To the very best of times, John."

_This could end differently. In another universe,_ a quiet voice says to him, but he waits patiently for John to take his hand, one last time, in this world. A world where they will unlikely ever meet again.

Something sparks right through him as John's warm palm touches his own, and he desperately wants to know what would happen if he was to kiss him. In this imaginary parallel world, he would kiss him and tell him that he loves him, and in his mind Mary would shoot John and kill Sherlock with him. There is no ideal way in any of the rarely-so-lazy universes.

And this is where they part ways, all three of them, and Mary is their bystander, watching them swallow the intensity of this farewell. All three of them thinking of the East Wind, which didn't manage to seek out the unworthy but the verily best of them instead.

Does it matter? They want to tell themselves that it doesn't matter anymore, as Sherlock disappears inside of the plane, for the East Wind will take us all in the end.

By all means, it is very unlikely that it doesn't. Improbable. But never impossible.

This is when the plane turns around, was so far from even reaching the top of the clouds, and John smiles genuinely because he never would've thought he could be more relieved about a high-pitched voice being all over London's screens, saying _Did you miss me? Did you miss me? Did you miss me?_

John Watson feared he really had to miss Sherlock Holmes forever this time.

Mary turns to him, sounding alarmed and not alarmed at all at once. _Interesting._

"But he’s dead. I mean, you told me he was dead, Moriarty."

"Absolutely. He blew his own brains out."

"So how can he be back?"

John isn't looking at her and fixes his gaze at the cloudy sky, imagining Sherlock looking out of the plane's window, down at him.

"Well, if he is … he'd better wrap up warm," and it is not exactly meant as a threat, but he knows it sounds like it.

" _There's an East Wind coming._ "


End file.
